Selling Selves Out Might Not Be Bad Blackwell Idea
By Roldo Bartimole

Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell certainly has the right and bright idea.

Let’s sell the Ohio Turnpike to the highest bidder!

So someone makes a few million dollars from Ohio motorists. So the highway deteriorates as the owners need to pile up their profits. So you might have to pay toll increases. So what. Who cares?

That’s better than taxing those people who give Blackwell campaign money. That’s better than alienating some rich people with fair taxation.

But why stop there? We could sell city main street thoroughfares. Just think of the revenue possibilities there.

With electronic devices acceptable now as revenue makers, someone could easily produce profits by recording license plates as cars pass along, and sending out monthly bills for those riding up or down Carnegie Avenue or Detroit Road, among many other roadways.

Maybe Dick Jacobs and Al Ratner automatically should get the street concession here in Cleveland. Only seems fair. They know how to do such things for us.

Isn’t that the way Mark Hanna and even Tom Johnson became millionaires in the last Century – having control of private streetcar routes.

It’s not so radical an idea. It’s worked before.

If we can’t sell the streets, maybe the street lights. I can see red stoplights with a Nike swish. Republican’s could use green stoplights by placing an American flag in the middle.

I think Blackwell is on to something.

Why not now have such entrepreneurs control the streets and make a buck or two for state and city governments?

Then we might sell the tree lawns (before the parks). Advertisers would be happy to place some ads along main and even side streets on tree lawns. A few more ads penetrating our psyche couldn’t hurt much.

How about highway air rights? Let’s leave no public resource unprofitable to someone. I’m sure some clever business person can think of something to do with air rights where tens of thousands of vehicles with people in them pass.

We could sell air rights above not only the Ohio Turnpike but also I-271 and all the other major highways around the state. That space could be used for more advertising by our great entrepreneurs.

Hey, let’s get our thinking caps on.

Don’t you think we could sell the portion of Lake Erie that touches land? Say 100 yards out? Then someone could make a buck from anyone who wants to go swimming. Seems fair enough. Why should people recreate for nothing while the State of Ohio has needs?

Just think of the revenue the state could claim. By letting more bonds based on the payments for these resources, we could avoid irritating rich people by taxing them. Wouldn’t that be a boon for our economy?

Who says I don’t have any positive ideas?

Now some might say that we should sell rights to the air we breathe. I think that’s going too far. Those who say that, I think that is just sour grapes. That is just trying to be sarcastic and put down some good entrepreneurial ideas. People are always too negative.

Water is important. Maybe some entrepreneurial wiz could buy Lake Erie water from Ohio and adjacent states and make payments, allowing those states to borrow bond money to do who knows what. So water prices might go up but we can see that people already are willing to pay more for bottled water than gasoline.

So where’s the drawback?

We might go a bit further with this idea.

Suppose we could legislate that each Ohioan would give just one day working free for some entrepreneur who could use us with a per capita fee given to the State of Ohio. At a price far lower, of course, than the minimum wage. Might that not also be worth enough money possibly to run a larger bureaucracy and at the same time help business more than other states are willing to do.

Why not show some ingenuity? We have to think out of the box, don’t you think.

We also have all kinds of public buildings that could be sold and rented back. Doesn’t that make sense?

Should Ken Blackwell become Governor, I’m sure he will use his great creativity to sell out more of Ohio so that we can jump ahead of Michigan and Pennsylvania, etc. in providing business with advantages it can get nowhere else!

I ask all my readers, especially those into boosting entrepreneurship, to add to my limited knowledge in this area and come up with better ideas to help our wealthy brothers and sisters use their already huge talents in making government work for them.

Let’s go out there! I’m sure there are many more natural resources that we can capitalize on, if you know what I mean.

How about renting Blackwell’s forehead if he becomes Governor? He’ll get a lot of TV exposure in four years. McDonald’s might be interested.

Toyota maybe?

From Cool Cleveland contributor Roldo Bartimole roldoATadelphia.net (:divend:)